Many American scientists are fed up with press reports and questions
from Congress and the public about scientific misconduct. The concern
is drastically overblown, they say, and the government should spend less
time and money investigating the few bad apples and concentrate on
expanding appropriations for research. After all, some of the most
highly publicized charges of misconduct eventually have been dismissed,
these scientists note. Relatively few scientists have been found guilty
of misconduct, so no elaborate investigative apparatus or intrusive
federal rules are needed.

These feelings seem heartfelt and widely shared. What's worrisome is
how unscientific they appear.

Well, it's unscientific to make repeated
assertions that scientific misconduct is an extremely small or
non-existent problem when we have few or no reliable data supporting
those claims. In an extreme example, a 1987 editorial in
Science said: "99.9999% of all published reports are truthful
and accurate, often in rapidly advancing frontiers where accurate data
are difficult to collect."

There is no basis for this claim, despite the air of scientific
precision conferred by the four digits following the decimal point.
Then(as now) we had no direct data on the accuracy of the scientific
literature. We simply do not know whether a lot or just a little
untruthful information is published. In fact, many scientists vehemently
objected a few years ago to a proposed experiment to gather anonymous
data on the prevalence of gross misconduct in biomedical research. In
the absence of such data, scientists are not exempt from the normal
requirement that they be accurate in their public statements.

Moreover, think about the implications of the argument that because
scientific misconduct is rare, government does not need regulations and
an apparatus to respond. How could the public react to the thesis that
because counterfeiting is rare, laws against it and facilities for
testing suspect currency cannot be justified?

It's also unscientific to make repeated assertions about the causes of
scientific misconduct. Here, too, we lack data. Yet the literature is
awash with pronouncements. Typical is a report in Chemical &
Engineering News of a session at the 1996 meeting of the American
Chemical Society in which one panelist asserted: "But 'fraud in science'
is not a real problem. That is because of the psychology of the
perpetrators of fraud, and the self-checking nature of the system. The
psychopathology of fraud is such that its perpetrators hardly ever
contain themselves to manufacturing routine data. Instead, they doctor
something important.

What are "routine data"? How does a chemist understand the
psychological mindset of perpetrators of fraud without conducting
research into the issue? Why are accomplished scientists speaking
without evidence to support their assertions? The answer, I believe, is
that some structural aspects of universities lead top scientists to
minimize the existence of problems and to ignore the possibilities for
misconduct that are inherent in research.

The first structural issue is what I call the paradox of the university.
A good one is organized so that the active scientists are insulated from
what it takes to run it, so that they can think creatively and do
science. Productive scientists complain that they are plagued with
administrative work and committees, but most of that work is focused on
matters directly related to their professional lives --selecting their
students and colleagues, and supervising research facilities. Very
little is focused on the nitty-gritty of running a large enterprise:
what it takes to turn the lights on every day, do the paperwork required
by government agencies and foundations, pay the bills, dispose of
hazardous wastes, or respond to the odd conduct of troubled
individuals.

For the most part, this system operates as intended, so that working
scientists can, in fact, remain naive about the realities of day-to-day
problems outside their labs. So it's natural that they fail to
appreciate the need for rules and systems to deal with those problems.
But it doesn't mean those rules and systems aren't necessary.

The second structural issue can be called the bias of the best. In
their professional lives, the best people in an institution,
particularly the best scientists with exemplary standards of conduct,
typically associate only with other top scientists and outstanding
students. They normally don't deal much with more-ordinary colleagues,
including those whose work ethics or standards may be problematic.

They also have the power, when they do encounter misconduct, to handle
problems efficiently. Consider a recent, well-publicized case. When
Francis S. Collins, the highly respected director of the the National
Center for Human Genome Research, found last year that a junior
researcher had concocted data, he promptly retracted five published
papers on leukemia. The length of the formal procedures to pin down the
fraud and respond to it can be measured in months in that case, compared
to years in other cases.

The combined effect of the structural features I've noted is to shield
productive scientists--the sort who tend to become opinion leaders in
science--from encountering whole categories of problems. As a result,
many of them believe that problems are rare, that the few that occur can
be easily handled, and, thus, that no money need be spent to develop
procedures and train people to deal with misconduct.

They are more concerned that rules about scientific conduct will be (or
have been) used to penalize creative and novel science. I have been
unable to find a single instance of that happening, though, and I have
been searching for some time, including directly querying those who
frequently voice this concern. In fact, with Drummond Rennie, deputy
editor of the Journal of the American Mecial Association, I
noted the lack of examples in an article in the journal in 1993. Not
one example has been drawn to our attention since.

Some scientists also contend that government procedures for responding
to misconduct are superfluous because science is "self correcting."
Indeed, the chemist quoted earlier in Chemical & Engineering
News on the "fact" that misconduct is not a problem also said: "And
there are extraordinarily efficient self-correcting features in the
system of science--the more interesting the discovery or creation, the
more likely it is to be repeated and tested."

Recall what Francis Collins encountered. He found that for two years,
one of his graduate students had published data that were systematically
manufactured. The deception came to light, Collins said, when a
reviewer of the sixth manuscript in the series questioned whether the
data were fabricated. Note that it was two years before the misconduct
was discovered. Does fabrication that takes two years to discover in a
major project, headed by one of our pre-eminent scientists, demonstrate
the efficient operations of a 'self-correcting" scientific system?

In short, I believe that the leaders of science need to be more
realistic about the nature of the enterprise that they supervise and
defend. This includes recognizing the changes wrought by the explosive
growth in the number of scientists and graduate students over the last 20
to 30 years. Too much of today's thinking about the internal workings
of research is rooted in the mythology of the wise mentor standing
side-by-side with the apprentice, inculcating scientific standards and
traditions.

If this ever was an accurate depiction of science, it is not now.
Today, faculty members run laboratories in major universities that
routinely involve 20 or more people--students, postdoctoral students,
and technicians. How well are the traditions and ethical practices of
science being transmitted to students in such situations?

All institutions with research-training grants from the National
Institutes of Health now must provide instruction in the responsible
conduct of research. Some institutions have pioneered efforts such as
the "group mentoring" program run by Michael Zigmond and Beth Fischer at
the University of Pittsburgh. The best such programs, like theirs,
offer students guidance on a broad range of professional conduct,
including writing scientific papers, dealing ethically with human and
animal subjects of research, and finding jobs. This information would
(or should) have been transmitted directly from mentor to apprentice in
a smaller system. Many institutions, however, do not offer
comprehensive training; some simply arrange for one lecture on ethics
each term.

Scientists need to realize that they are not accorded as much trust as
they once were. Our society is significantly more cynical and less
trusting than it was before the Vietnam War and Watergate. Universities,
like almost every other sector of society, are much more heavily
regulated than in the past; many of those regulations were adopted after
scandals broke. Rules for protecting human research subjects are a
perfect example. Congressional attention having been attracted by the
Tuskegee syphilis study and a 1966 New England Journal of
Medicine article by Henry Beecher, a Harvard Medical School
professor, describing unethical treatment of humans in published
research projects.

If scientists and their institutions do not develop the tools (either
internally or at the federal level) to deal effectively with misconduct,
it seems inevitable that scandal will follow, and that more external
regulation will ensue. And rules imposed by outsiders are likely to be
more onerous than rules devised by scientists themselves.

Scientists also should realize that a startling number of legal claims
questioning internal decision making are filed against universities these
days. As a result, a conclusion among colleagues that serious scientific
malfeasance has occurred may not hold up legally. The university's
penalties against the malefactor may wind up being rescinded or
reduced.

What happens to the scientific environment when people violate generally
held concepts of right and wrong, and yet nothing happens to them,
either because their institution chooses not to act or because it is
powerless to act, as a result of inadequate rules and procedures? What
happens when allegations of misconduct are poorly handled or
white-washed, or when an innocent scientist is wrongly accused by a
malicious colleague and yet the investigation languished for years, or
when a whistle blower is vindicated but still suffers retaliation?

Cynicism flourishes, morale erodes, and the cohesiveness of the
scientific enterprise suffers, all because of a failure to honor the
scientific principle of an unbiased search for the truth. The effects
are particularly devastating for students, who are supposed to be
learning to act according to the highest scientific and personal
standards.

In light of all this, it becomes even more important for scientists to
base their opinions and actions upon factual understanding of how our
current system works--and doesn't. Right now, many scientists agree
that the system of dealing with misconduct charges desperately needs
overhauling, but they are resisting adoption of a revised federal
definition that would clarify when serious misconduct has occurred and
how that should be determined.

The findings last year of the Congressionally mandated
Commission on Research Integrity
(on which I served) have been roundly criticized.
The panel proposed expanding the current federal definition of
misconduct--fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism--to include
intentional theft of, or damage to, research equipment or experiments.
It also would cover misconduct by scientists when they review the
research proposals and manuscripts of other scientists. Finally, it
would add sub-definitions of each type of misconduct. For example, it
would define plagiarism as "the presentation of the documented words or
ideas of another as his or her own, without attribution appropriate for
the medium of presentation."

The recommendations were based on 15 months of public hearings and on
the examination of thousands of pages of material documenting past cases
of misconduct. Yet some scientists seem to fear that every scientific
dispute or disagreement would be transformed into the proverbial federal
case if the definition of misconduct were changed. Some object to the
"legalistic" tone of the proposed definition or argue that some acts,
such as vandalism, already are covered by other regulations or laws.

Scant attention is paid, however, to the fact that the legal
shortcomings of the current definition--its complete lack of
specificity--have subjected universities to unreasonable obstacles in
administering it. Nor is attention paid to the reality that state and
local laws do not, in practice, cover vandalism to research equipment
and experiments.

I recently led a three-day workshop for university administrators who
investigate charges of research misconduct. Over and over, I heard the
current definition summed up this way: "It doesn't work. it just
doesn't work."

The current definition does not give enough guidance as to what conduct
is covered: Does plagiarism encompass only stolen words, or ideas,
too? How should investigators assess intent? How should they attempt
to prove that data have been fabricated, and how conclusive must the
proof be? What should be done in cases involving labs in which the
records are so poor that one really can't tell whether the published
data were ever collected, or when?

Federal rules on misconduct are not going to disappear; Congress will
see to that. So it is time for scientific leaders to respond
realistically to efforts to improve the federal rules. researchers must
be willing to support the adoption of a workable federal definition of
misconduct: one inclusive enough to cover the existing range of
misconduct, treat all scientists involved fairly, and withstand legal
challenges to investigators' conclusions.

Similarly, researchers must understand that finding the truth about
charges of misconduct is a paramount obligation, and that charges must
be investigated according to established procedures that are fair to the
accuser and to the accused. Probes must rely upon facts--not
personalities or reputations--as the basis for decisions.

We also must create environments in which questions about the
responsible conduct of research are discussed freely. Students cannot
become professionals entirely by osmosis or by taking a single ethics
course. The gray areas that exist in the norms (and there are many)
must be legitimate and common topics of conversation.

Institutions also should adopt and enforce higher standards of
professional conduct than the bare minimum required under any federal
definition of misconduct.

Together, all these actions can help produce the scholarly climate we
need. Such changes clearly will require new leadership from within,
however. The conservatism of academic senates has meant that little is
done or has been done in the past to regulate the conduct of university
scientists in the absence of an external requirement.

Scientists' current stand against a new definition of misconduct to
replace the existing inadequate one is dangerous. Scandals happen.
We do not have adequate tools to deal effectively with the next ones,
which are sure to come.

C.K. Gunsalus is associate provost at the University of Illinois
at Urbana-Champaign. This article is adapted from a presentation at a
symposium, "Science in Crisis at the Millennium" at George Washington
University.